Thursday, May 7, 2009

Some Brewer has to be the Smallest

I live in Minnesota, but damned near in Iowa. The first Iowa town, 15 miles down the road from here, is Northwood. What's Northwood famous for? Nothing. It's a bump in the road. It's a bump with one neat thing - a micro brewery. A mini micro brewery. Peter Ausenhus runs Worth Brewing, a brewery/bar out of an old bank building. He trys to offer some interesting brews, with always a handful of his own beers on tap so customers can sample a variety. Sorry, no bottles, no growlers. Important update!!! Peter does, in fact have growlers!

What sets this operation apart from most others is its scale. He brews two batches every Monday and two batches every Tuesday, and more during the week as needed. He's forced to brew a lot of batches because of his capacity. “This is tiny. This is only a 10 gallon system, so it’s almost like a home brewery size,” Ausenhus said. “Generally a professional brewery, at the minimum, is about ten times this size. So I think I’m the smallest licensed brewery in the country, actually.” (info from the A.L.Trib)